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"The preloaded "game" in question is actually an interactive application titled Neon, created by lightsynth guru Jeff Minter of Llamasoft.

I find the name rather funny since the last console projects to contain a Jeff Minter light show built in tanked rather hard.

Granted I can appreciate the Nuon and even the Jaguar CD slightly but I'm really hoping for the 360 to die a miserable death. I can only see Minter's VLM as being another nail in the coffin.

My apologies to Jeff Minter. I don't wish him bad, I just think he ties himself to doomed projects.

Looks like they're trying to bring back the Nuon. The Nuon played DVD's, CD, and games. An SDK was released and a few homebrew apps have been released for it, too. Maybe this has a better chance of survival than the Nuon did, but it'll be an uphill battle. The guys at VMLabs learned the hard way that consumers and developers both hate machines that aren't quite PCs and aren't quite consoles.

D

As a big fan of the Yak, I actually picked up a Samsung N501 DVD player a few months ago, which comes with Nuon capabilities and the best VLM built in to the BIOS - you could get them for as low as $80 on close-out in some Web stores.

Incidentally, beware - some Nuon players like the Samsung Extiva have non-interactive VLM, it's a lot more fun to be able to control the effects with a joypad too.)

As a big fan of the Yak, I actually picked up a Samsung N501 DVD player a few months ago, which comes with Nuon capabilities and the best VLM built in to the BIOS - you could get them for as low as $80 on close-out in some Web stores.

Incidentally, beware - some Nuon players like the Samsung Extiva have non-interactive VLM, it's a lot more fun to be able to control the effects with a joypad too.)

The Nuon is an amazing chill-out box. The VLM is built-in, and (IMHO) much trippier and fluid than the Jaguar version (and it's got joystick control! That is, if you can find a Nuon joystick!)

It's also got some great homebrew stuff:
- Bomb by Andreas Binner (a very fun, cartoonish Bombuzal clone)
-several whacked out apps by Tim Prezzano (Ambient Monsters! A strange underwater journey, and an Atart2600 pacman port)
- and some future stuff by Skah_T that looks amazing.
Screens at http://www.nuon-dome.com/download.html

It looks like Unity will finally allow the Gamecube to surpass the Nuon as the ultimate chill-box!! Sweeeeet..

I remember a tech demo for the pretty much failed Nuon (a chipset which was installed OEM into standard DVD players to let them play games)which was games of Doom rendered onto the surfaces of spinning cubes...

Another point to suggest Doom is an inspiration to lots of games designers...

Check out products incorporating the NUON processor (formerly from VM Labs, recently bought out by Genesis Microchip), such as the Toshiba SD-2300 and Samsung N-2000, N-501, and N-504. NUON-enhanced DVDs contain additional info in the form of (tada!) HTML and Bob scripts - the DVDs play normally on regular players, the enhanced features are available on products like those above.

There are some NUON-enhanced DVDs available. You can also play games on these units, although it is by no means intended as a PS2/XBox/etc competitor. You can even download the NUON SDK and hack your own NUON programs! Check out the NUON dome for more info.

Disclaimer: I used to work for VM Labs. I don't anymore (left in September 2001), and have no business or financial connection with either VM Labs or Genesis Microchip. I still think the technology is pretty cool, though.

Check out products incorporating the NUON processor (formerly from VM Labs, recently bought out by Genesis Microchip), such as the Toshiba SD-2300 and Samsung N-2000, N-501, and N-504. NUON-enhanced DVDs contain additional info in the form of (tada!) HTML and Bob scripts - the DVDs play normally on regular players, the enhanced features are available on products like those above.

There are some NUON-enhanced DVDs available. You can also play games on these units, although it is by no means intended as a PS2/XBox/etc competitor. You can even download the NUON SDK and hack your own NUON programs! Check out the NUON dome for more info.

Disclaimer: I used to work for VM Labs. I don't anymore (left in September 2001), and have no business or financial connection with either VM Labs or Genesis Microchip. I still think the technology is pretty cool, though.

Not to cast doubt on your argument, but then why didn't Nuon succeed? There are a few products available, but not the breakout success you'd expect from simple product differentiation.

-Kevin